Community Living: Help Is On The Way

Spring is here and for most of us living in Canada, hibernation time is over. We want to spend our time outdoors enjoying the sunshine and warmer weather.

Spring also means children will be running all over the place having fun. We need to pay much closer attention to wherever we are driving and how fast our vehicles are moving. It only takes a few seconds for a child to run out in front of a car or even an enthusiastic cyclist.

To help refresh your spring traffic and child safety rules of the road, here is a link to Canada’s Safety Council’s site.

We hear a lot today about accidents resulting from drivers who have collided into others already involved in an accident because they are not paying attention to what is going on in front of them and to the side.

Recently, Barbara Kennedy of Changing Gears, was witness to a traffic accident about 5 minutes from her home. It was one of the loudest she had experienced and saw two cars crash into one another in the middle of an intersection.

When none of the cars closer to the scene made an effort to go and see if everyone was Ok, Barb did. She noticed there were two teenage girls in one of the cars. The driver was very upset by the experience and her friend was a little dazed and they were trying to comfort one another. Since they could, Barb guided them to safer ground and onto the sidewalk.

As the cars were pretty badly damaged, she asked some of the other people watching if anyone had called the police and was told yes. Barb then called the driver’s mother and told her about the accident, that her daughter was just fine and because of her age, the mother needed to come to the scene. She then stayed with the girls until their mother arrived and hung around to give an accounting of the scene.

Within only a few minutes, local police, an ambulance and firemen were on the scene to ensure all was well and to block off the roads while they did what we pay them to do.

Barb could not believe while standing there how many times cars did not slow down and simply drove around the scene. The police admitted that it happens all the time stating “Everyone is in too much of a hurry and these drivers do not care about anything else other than where they are supposed to be”.

Barb thanked the police for being there and was grateful for being able to let all of the professionals take over and do what they are trained to do.

Spring is here. Please slow down and pay attention to what is going on in front and around you. It could be one of your children in one of those accidents needing another adults’ compassion to get them through those first horrific moments of realizing what has happened.

Whether the driver is your elderly parent, a spouse who made a poor decision, a teen driver still under the graduating licensing phase or simply someone in the wrong place at the wrong time, these things will always spark emotionally charged conversations. Perhaps it's best to wait for another day to have them when you are both better able to handle the situation.

After all, if someone you love is in an accident of any kind, the only thing that should matter that day is being thankful that they are alive and uninjured.

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